SAVANNAH GUTHRIE MOM MISSING: DAY 40

Summary

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Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

Episode: SAVANNAH GUTHRIE MOM MISSING: DAY 40

Date: March 12, 2026
Podcast: iHeartPodcasts and CrimeOnline
Host: Nancy Grace

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Episode Overview

This episode centers on the ongoing investigation into the disappearance of Nancy Guthrie, mother of Today Show host Savannah Guthrie, who has now been missing for 40 days. Nancy Grace and a panel of experts provide an in-depth look at the renewed FBI efforts, including advanced forensic work, the search for key evidence, new angles on possible suspects, and the utilization (and limitations) of AI in the case. They also examine the impact of media exposure and what can be gathered from recently resurfaced videos and surveillance footage connected to the case.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. FBI Forensics and Shoe Impression Evidence

(02:02–11:00)

• Electrostatic Lifting & Shoe Casts:
  • Joseph Scott Morgan explains shoe impression evidence, distinguishing between traditional casting and electrostatic lifts.
  • Electrostatic lifts can “freeze in time” an otherwise invisible print on tile or non-porous surfaces, possibly helping to identify the perpetrator’s footwear.
• Challenges Due to Crime Scene Contamination:
  • The scene was not secured early on, with the public and media freely accessing the porch and interior.
    • “Anybody and their little sister could walk up to the front porch and take photos because [the sheriff’s office] did not secure the scene, not once, but twice.” — Nancy Grace [06:59]
  • Key evidence, such as a bloody mat, was not collected immediately, risking the integrity of forensic results.
  • “Once you take that tape down, it is open season at that point. Any attorney worth their salt can argue, hey, look, anything can be planted in there.” — Joseph Scott Morgan [07:30]

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2. Clues from Media Content: Bedroom Video and Accessibility

(11:00–18:15)

• A 2013 Today Show video featuring Nancy Guthrie at home is scrutinized for clues regarding the home layout (e.g., bedroom window at ground level), items visible, and what a potential perpetrator could have learned.
  • The video resurfaced and circulated online after Megyn Kelly highlighted its relevance.
• Discussion on how videos and public profiles can unintentionally reveal personal vulnerabilities.

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3. Tattoo Removal as a Perpetrator Identifier

(18:59–25:45)

• Expert Interview: Jeff Garnett, Inkless Tattoo Removal Centers
  • Garnett shares a previous case where a perpetrator sought immediate tattoo removal after a crime, highlighting how tattoo patterns (such as full sleeves) might connect suspects to crime scene visuals.
  • “He came into one of our locations trying to get his sleeves removed ... Aftercare instructions were found in his car.” — Jeff Garnett [19:34]
  • Full sleeve removal with lasers takes at least a year, not days. Immediate removal would require drastic surgical excision, leaving significant scars.
  • “Be on the lookout for a male trying to have two full sleeves or at least one full sleeve...removed.” — Nancy Grace [21:44]
  • Majority of people remove tattoos because they've outgrown them, but crimes connected to distinctive ink do occur.

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4. FBI Reinvestigates Key Restaurant Contacts

(28:47–34:29)

• FBI spent two days re-interviewing employees and possibly patrons at El Charo, the restaurant where Savannah and Nancy Guthrie dined during a filmed visit.
• Investigators are probing circles of communication: “Who was told about the Guthries’ visit? Did anyone relay this to a person with criminal intent?”
• Law enforcement likely reviewing credit card records and available guest data from the restaurant to build a network of connections and leads.
  • “It’s unlikely that it was happenstance that an abductor happened to be in the restaurant that day...” — Brian Fitzgibbons [33:24]

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5. Surveillance Video and Evidence Collection

(34:29–37:16)

• Discussion extends to possible surveillance camera footage, neighborhood video, and digital trails.
• Fox News reports mention a ransom letter, which the Guthrie family acknowledges but says they’re prepared to negotiate for Nancy’s return.

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6. Artificial Intelligence: The Ransom Note & Digital Tracing

(37:16–42:49)

• Christian Hammond, Northwestern University, discusses AI limitations:
  • Perpetrators could use generative AI to craft ransom notes with untraceable authorship.
  • “The power of the language models is that you can have them say something that you want to say, but in a tone and in a cadence of words that is not yours...you’ll leave a little bit of a trace...but that trace is so minute and is so washed out...that you wouldn’t be able to find it.” — Christian Hammond [37:16]
  • Even with advanced search algorithms, tracking down a single AI request (“write a ransom note”) is nearly impossible due to data scale and privacy limits.
  • Retinal scans from porch footage are discussed but dismissed due to insufficient image quality and lack of a matching sample:
    • “You need that as the target...if you don’t have a target, it’s incredibly difficult to find the right thing at the right time that gives you the right kind of information.” — Christian Hammond [41:44]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Crime Scene Mishandling:
  • “They did not collect that mat the first time out. You know, I sit there and I think of it...that’s crime scene 101.” — Joseph Scott Morgan [07:30]
• On the Impact of Public Exposure:
  • “Whoever searched Savannah Guthrie’s salary and Nancy Guthrie’s home address may very well have pulled up video just like this.” — Nancy Grace [12:58]
• On Use of AI in Ransom Notes:
  • “It’s not a perfect world in terms of privacy...even with the finding the images associated with this particular camera, there were privacy issues...there’s always this.” — Christian Hammond [40:28]
• On Community Investigation:
  • “It may not be that they're focused solely on that restaurant employee, but who’s on their periphery, who’s in their circle that they told about this event...” — Brian Fitzgibbons [31:44]

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Key Timestamps

• 02:02: Start of case discussion, FBI efforts, shoe print evidence
• 04:49: Prof. Joseph Scott Morgan explains shoe impression forensic techniques
• 06:59: Nancy decries crime scene mishandling
• 09:09: Detailed explanation of electrostatic lifting
• 11:47: Analysis of resurfaced bedroom video (Today Show footage)
• 18:59: Discussion with Jeff Garnett about tattoo removal and implications for suspect identification
• 29:36: Dave Mack on FBI’s two-day restaurant employee re-interrogation
• 34:29: Nancy and Brian Fitzgibbons discuss surveillance video and restaurant guest records
• 37:16: AI expert Christian Hammond on ransom notes, privacy and search limitations
• 41:44: Feasibility of retinal scans for suspect ID

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Final Takeaways

• The case continues to face obstacles due to early crime scene mismanagement and media attention inadvertently aiding potential perpetrators.
• Forensic technology offers promise (shoe prints, DNA from fabrics), but only if evidence has not been compromised by outsider access.
• Digital investigation is stymied by both the vastness and privacy of online data—AI-generated ransom notes are difficult, if not impossible, to tie to any suspect without a specific digital trail.
• Law enforcement is actively pursuing every angle, especially focusing on those who may have learned about Nancy Guthrie’s vulnerability from her daughter’s public profile and local restaurant appearances.
• Community assistance is crucial—authorities urge anyone with information to come forward, noting a substantial reward is offered.

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To provide tips:

• Call: 800-225-5324 (toll-free) or 520-882-7463 (anonymous)
• Reward: Over $1.2 million for information leading to Nancy Guthrie’s whereabouts (no arrest or conviction required).

---

Summary by [Assistant], Podcast Summarizer

Transcript

[Nancy Grace]

This is an iHeart podcast.

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Life moves really quickly at American Military University. They're ready to help you keep up. AMU's flexible, affordable online programs in cybersecurity, IT, space studies and more are designed for service members, veterans and their families. AMU provides the support you need to take the next step wherever life takes you. American Military University Built for what's next. Learn more at AMU apus. Edu that's AMU apus. Edu Crime stories with Nancy Grace, Savannah Guthrie's mother. Nancy Guthrie missing day one forty. Tonight, an elite squad at Quantico. The FBI trying to create a shoe cast. This, as we learn, the FBI has returned to a particular restaurant to reintegrate restaurant employees. And what about the possibility of retinal scanning of the porch guy? And this as apb. All points bulletin on a male trying to have a full sleeve removed. A full sleeve tattoo removed. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. I want to thank you for being with us. The stalkers cannot help but write about their relationship with the victim and the victim's families. This perpetrator had gleaned a lot about Nancy Guthrie's life. The perp likely has a criminal history. Maybe the stalker did glean a lot, but what evidence did the perp? I'm not convinced he's a stalker of Nancy Guthrie. I think that he is a con trying to make a quick dollar or million. What clues did he unwittingly leave behind? We have analyzed him from the top of his head to the soles of his shoes. Enter professor forensics, Jacksonville State University. Joseph Scott Morgan, death investigator, author of Blood Beneath My Feet on Amazon, and star of a hit podcast series Body Bags with Joseph Scott Morgan. I was concerned about any possibility of a shoe print because the walkway to Nancy Guthrie's home, if we could see that, I believe is gravel. But let's start with A and end at Z. What is a shoe cast? And what is electromagnetic lifting?

[Joseph Scott Morgan]

Okay. There's any number of ways to raise a shoe print, if you will. Traditionally, what we think of, and we still do this, Nancy, if you think about a foot going into a soft malleable surface, like mud, soft dirt, even sand, you leave behind an impression. Okay? And we can cast that. We can put dental stone in there, let it dry, pull it out, and you have this image of the shoe print. Here we have an example, for instance, of an electrostatic lift. This is completely different. This is where. Where we put down a charged sheet of Mylar and it actually goes over an area where there is a suspected print that's generally left in soil or dust. That's not really. You're not able to see it with the unaided eye very well. But what it does is that there is a magnetic charge and that lifts that print off of that surface and you can pull it up and you can actually examine it. Here we have an example of an electrostatic lift being conducted just yesterday at Jacksonville State. And for My money in this particular case, Nancy, I'm leaning more into the electrostatic lift here because, you know, you don't have a lot of soft mud around there or soft dirt that you're going through. But even if you look at that porch, Nancy, look at that porch. Those are tiles out there. Now, there would be a myriad of prints out there, but what if they went in there and actually did electrostatic lifts there? And also if they can determine where the point of entry is in this house, go to the interior of the house and do those lifts there. If there's an area around her bed where you've got kind of a smooth, non porous or less than porous surface, like a ceramic tile there, which a lot of houses in the southwest have, you do that around her bed. You see if there's any kind of weird, weird prints that are there, like a man's sneaker imprint that's left. And that is possible. You can do that. I just hope it's not too late. I hope that they protected that scene initially, but I got to tell you, hope's dimming as far as I'm concerned.

[Nancy Grace]

Just got. Morgan, don't you remember at the get go where anybody and their little sister could walk up to the front porch and take photos because nanos did not secure the scene, not once, but twice. Did not secure the scene. Ghouls were going up and taking photos of Nancy Guthrie's blood on the front porch. This is from our friends at Kold. And as a matter of fact, someone tried to deliver a pizza to the crime scene. That's how unprotected it was. How is that going to affect any

[Joseph Scott Morgan]

hope of a she cast tremendously? As, you know, as an attorney, Nancy, once you take that tape down, it is open season at that point. Any attorney worth their salt can argue, hey, look, anything can be planted in there. You want to know real big evidence of this and the carelessness that was taken with the stuff seen. I'll always go back to this is when you see that blood deposition on the, on the surface of that portico area there, Nancy. The one thing you always see and you can see the perp standing on it like there. Look at that. Look at that standing on that mat, Nancy. We saw images of that mat adjacent to the blood. They did not collect that mat the first time out. You know, I sit there and I think of it. Does your mind work? You know, that's, that's, that's crime scene 101. Why was not the mat collected at that point? In time, because you have any number of things that could be transferred onto that service. I hope somebody went back and collected it. But once you've taken the guard, the guardrails down, at that point in time, it's open, anybody can walk up and take a photo. Anybody. It can be argued in court that you can plant stuff. And at that point in time, it is paramount that you protect that scene. And there's just by virtue of the fact that you did not value that mat any more than they obviously didn't, then you're. You're at risk here from losing valuable evidence. And anybody can have access to it. Any lawyer worth their salt can say, yeah, stuff was planted. They secured it, they took the tape down. Lord only knows who got in there.

[Nancy Grace]

What is an electrostatic lift?

[Joseph Scott Morgan]

Okay, so what you're doing with this, this sheet of Mylar is that you're actually placing a charge on that sheet, okay? And as you place that charge on there, what happens is it attracts. It attracts underlying dust particles, lifts it onto that sheet, and boom, it's permanently there. Okay? So you for. And this is the beauty of it. For a moment, for a moment, you have frozen in time that image of that shoe impression that's there. Now here's the trick. Can you take that image that you've frozen on that sheet, okay, and take it back and compare it. Well, can you profile that footprint? Like, can someone that is a footprint expert say, okay, we're looking for somebody that pronates, supinates. Can we categorize the shoe print? Can we say, okay, this manufacturer created this soul, okay? And you can say, whatever manufacturer, you know, insert company there. All right? And if you can begin. And again, as you know, Nancy, with investigations, it's a big investigative funnel. You want to try to narrow, narrow, narrow, narrow at all times. We want to try to exclude as much stuff as we. More stuff. We want to try to exclude as much as we possibly can to narrow our field. Can they take images, for instance, of those shoes that we see right here captured at the scene in the still shots? Can they profile those shoes and say, okay, this is the manufacturer of those shoes? Automatically, you've narrowed your field. And can you say if you do the electrostatic lift, can you say, is it a possibility, Is it a possibility that that particular brand of shoe could leave this kind of impression? Well, now you have really, you know, kind of fine tuned your target area at this point in time. To trick now is to find out who belongs to those shoes, who was wearing those shoes at that point, I

[Nancy Grace]

know it works in a lab, but given the fact that the general public could go right up onto her porch and how many people from the sheriff's office were in and out of the home on the interior, I don't know that we can get this type of evidence. There's still a chance. Straight out to Dave Mack joining us, crime stories investigative reporter. What can you tell me about re emerging video of the interior of Nancy Guthrie's bedroom, which I'd like to point out has a window right there on ground level. You can look right into and see her bedroom, the layout, everything, how close her bed is to the door, the window, the works. What is this?

[Dave Mack]

Dave Mack, what you're seeing is when the Today show went, they were trying to show the closeness of Savannah Guthrie with her mom, Nancy, and showing this side of Nancy Guthrie, the mom, showing how she taught Savannah to make a bed. And that's why you see her doing the corners there. But what it this was done in an effort to, you know, make it more personable and connecting with their audience. But what it's showing is that is her bedroom, Nancy Guthrie's bedroom. And she's been in this home since the 90s. She's been in the same bedroom, same layout ever since. So as you pointed out, the window is right there. We are looking at Savannah Guthrie's mom, Nancy Guthrie in the room with the bed might be pulled out of the night she was kidnapped.

[Nancy Grace]

And we see what she keeps on her bedside table and more. Hey, Dave Mack, Megyn Kelly found this and brought it to everyone's attention. When was that taken? When was that shoot from our friends at today with Mrs. Guthrie?

[Dave Mack]

It was in 2013

[Nancy Grace]

because I started to say she's getting around really well and does not seem to have any mobility issue. But you know, many years have passed since then. Let's take a look at that video again because whoever searched Savannah Guthrie's salary and Nancy Guthrie's home address may very well have pulled up video just like this. What clues can we glean from this video? A lot. A lot from our friends at Today.

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[Joseph Scott Morgan]

Just looking. Well you look at the nature of the flooring and it's really hard to kind of kind of pick up and and try to understand it. Has it changed over that period of time? Is it a smooth kind of semi porous floor that we could go in and collect anything relative to shoe prints? You know one of the things that you begin to think about is that folks were saying that she was taken from her bedroom. First off, I don't understand how they source that information particularly.

[Nancy Grace]

But it's certainly because Savannah said it in one of her. Her pleas. She said my mom was taken out of her bed.

[Joseph Scott Morgan]

Well, you have to take that. You have to take that and utilize that as. And I'm sure that they already have, because if she's saying that, that that's rooted somewhere factually. So you're going to look at any kind of fiscal evidence that might be associated with. With an outside party that's there. And it could be anything from dusty prints that are left behind by shoes. It could be any kind of trace evidence, any kind of fiber evidence where they're putting hands on somebody to move them around.

[Nancy Grace]

We also see that bedspread, if she still has the same one, and obviously an M Vac would have to be used on that. It is a porous material to get potential DNA Straight out to Brian Fitzgibbons joining us. He is director Operations, usp, a nationwide security, leading a team of investigators that specialize in missing people and go around the world finding them, rescuing them particularly. He has an expertise in extractions from Mexico. He is a former Marine and Iraqi war vet. Brian Fitzgibbons, I can learn a lot from that video and so could anybody, including the perpetrator.

[Brian Fitzgibbons]

Yeah, certainly. And we see that the perp would have access to this readily online. You know, is he looking to see, are there camera locations inside of the house? Are there avenues of entry or egress in that room? And all of this should be caveated with the fact that there was incredible amount of tension drawn to Mrs. Guthrie with Savannah's visit and the visit to that restaurant that the FBI is now conducting interviews again with restaurant staff.

[Nancy Grace]

At some point he reaches up to dismantle or up the door.

[Dave Mack]

Can I see black and gray work? I can see some subtle shading on the edges.

[Nancy Grace]

And when he does that, much is revealed. Joining us now, a special guest, Jeff Garnett, co founder, Inkless tattoo removal centers. Inklesstattooremoval.com Jeff, I know that you, like me, have studied carefully the porch guy's wrist tattoo. Got a question for you, Jeff. Have you ever been asked by a perpetrator to remove a tattoo?

[Jeff Garnett]

Yes, actually, we have. We didn't know at the time that it was perpetrator, but in. In 2021, there was a shooting death outside of a famous hotel in Manhattan and it was all caught on surveillance camera. The perpetrator was. His picture was shown on the news and everyone kept commenting on the fact that he had these full tattoo sleeves. Later the following week, a detective came in and questioned us because they had arrested him, and they found our aftercare instructions in his car. So what had happened is the shooting had happened, I think, on a. On a Thursday. It was all over the news the following morning. And that Friday, he came into one of our locations trying to get his sleeves removed. So we didn't know at the time, but they were able to show that that was his attempt to cover up the identifying marks.

[Nancy Grace]

So the video caught him with two full sleeves?

[Jeff Garnett]

Yes.

[Nancy Grace]

Wow. Okay. And in his car, they found your aftercare instructions. Okay. How long would it take to remove a full sleeve? JEFF garnett it takes a long time.

[Jeff Garnett]

It's not an instant thing where you come in and laser it and it's gone instantly. We would all love for the technology to get there, but we're not quite there at this point. Probably at least a year. There are a lot of variables. Different ink colors, different ink saturation levels, locations on the body, how healthy someone's immune system is. These are all factors that can impact it. But basically, the laser is breaking the ink into microscopic particles that are much easier for your immune system to remove. So we're pretty much just speeding up the natural fading process. When I started doing this 15 years ago, it would have easily taken three years. With the newer Pico technology, it's cut that in half, but it's still a year to a year and a half.

[Nancy Grace]

Bologna. Be on the lookout for a male trying to have two full sleeves or at least one full sleeve out of the Catalina heels area removed. Back to Jeff Garnett joining us, co founder, Inkless Tattoo Removal CENTERS so it takes a long time to finally get a full sleeve removed. Could you rush it? If someone said, I've got to have this thing off in 48 hours, could you do it? Is it physically possible?

[Jeff Garnett]

Not with laser technology. The only way to do it instantly would be a surgical procedure called excision, where they would have to cut it out. And if that was a small tattoo, they'd be able to cut it out and it would be replaced with a scar, and that would be done by a plastic surgeon. If you're talking about a full sleeve, it would get into skin grafts. It just wouldn't be possible. Laser technology can remove that, but it's going to take a long time. Now we're assuming the perp has a sleeve because you're seeing that wrist portion, and it looks as if it's part of a much larger tattoo. Could that small portion be cut out? Surgically yes, it could, but there would definitely be a large scar in the place.

[Nancy Grace]

Once you have the tattoo completely removed, are there any traces left behind? You have an example on your neck, correct?

[Jeff Garnett]

Yes. I used to have a tattoo right here, and there's nothing. It's. There's no scar tissue. There's no shadow or skin discoloration.

[Joseph Scott Morgan]

It.

[Jeff Garnett]

You know, it depends. There's certain ink colors are easier to remove than others, but it looks to me like this is a black tattoo, black ink tattoo. And black ink responds really well to the laser. Black absorbs the full spectrum of light from the laser. So usually black ink can be removed completely.

[Nancy Grace]

It's a black and gray, which, of course, is just variations on black. So you're absolutely correct. I'm just curious. What was the tattoo you had removed?

[Jeff Garnett]

It was a bat. It was a silly bat hanging upside down behind my head.

[Nancy Grace]

A bat, as in the bat that flies out of a cave and jumps in your hair and tries to bite you?

[Jeff Garnett]

Correct.

[Nancy Grace]

Okay. Why did you have a bat on your neck?

[Jeff Garnett]

A lot of my tattoos are kind of timestamps of different parts of my life, and I had moved temporarily to Austin, Texas, and there's a bridge in Austin that has about a million bats that live underneath it, and at dusk, they all come flying out. So that was kind of my Austin, Texas, tattoo.

[Nancy Grace]

Okay. I'm not a shrink. I can't analyze that. I'll just take it for what it is, for the probative value. But why do other people have tattoos removed? Typically,

[Jeff Garnett]

there's a wide range of purposes. Sometimes people get a tattoo and don't like the way it came out, so they almost immediately want to get rid of it. There's the stereotypical boyfriend and girlfriend. Get each other's names and then break up. There's the most common one is people just outgrow it. You know, you get something in your teens or twenties, and then in your thirties and forties, your tastes change, and you're a different person. But there also are some really more psychological reasons as well. You have really sad things like victims of human trafficking that have property of tattoos. And that's some of the things that we do pro bono for people. You have radiation tattoos for people, cancer survivors from when they had their procedures. So there really is a wide range. But the majority of the clients we see got something when they were younger. They've outgrown it, and their tastes have changed, and they're just.

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[Nancy Grace]

Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Jeff Garnett is joining us. He is the co founder of Inkless tattoo removal centers with multiple branches. Be on the lookout, please. JEFF garnett, Full sleeve removal. That said, this leads me to another process, that process being AI used to create a ransom note. But first, before I get into that with Christian Hammond from Northwestern University. Dave Mac, what can you tell me about the last 48 hours where the FBI descends upon a Mexican restaurant to re interrogate employees? A full two days of reinterrogation.

[Dave Mack]

Nancy Guthrie and Savannah Guthrie went out to dinner back in November when the Today show came to town and was filming Savannah back in Tucson. They went to El Charo, which is their favorite Mexican restaurant. Well, the FBI has been back interviewing employees of the restaurant, specifically asking them if they noticed anyone standing around, maybe trying to ingratiate themselves with the cast and crew, anybody that acted weird. They were asking those types of questions of all of the employees in the El Charo, trying to determine if anyone was there that shouldn't have been or was acting inappropriately while they were there.

[Nancy Grace]

From our friends at today, you know, I'm very curious about their line of questioning to these restaurant employees. If they saw anyone there that day that was unusual, if anyone hung around, you know. To Brian Fitzgibbons joining us, director of Operations, USPA Nationwide Security. That must have been a memorable day for a lot of people to have a big star like Savannah Guthrie roll in. Very memorable. So it's not just the employees. They're going to be questioned about other people that were there that day to watch the filming. I guarantee Fitzgibbons, they're going to be asking, does anybody have a son, a black sheep son? Does anybody have a bad seed brother in law or son in law or cousin where the mom comes home and says, hey, guess what happened today. Savannah Guthrie was there with her mother or guess what's going to happen tomorrow. And what I want to do with that bride, Fitzgibbons is overlay it onto that Google trend search where someone thought to question Savannah Guthrie's salary and in the same search the home address for Nancy Guthrie and then connect that person to someone we may find out about through the restaurant Employees.

[Brian Fitzgibbons]

Certainly a focus of those questions is going to be, who did you tell about this? Did you text anybody? Did you call anybody? Am I able to look at that text to see who. How did they respond?

[Jeff Garnett]

Right.

[Brian Fitzgibbons]

It may not be that they're focused solely on that restaurant employee, but who's on their periphery, who's in their circle that they told about this event, and they told about Ms. Guthrie living in Tucson, being connected to Savannah.

[Nancy Grace]

So it's not just limited to the employees. It's who they know, who they're related to, who may have been in the restaurant at that time. The line of questioning. I'm very curious about what that is, what it means, what we can glean from the FBI spending not one, but two full days at the restaurant. So we believe. Well, there are two restaurants in play that we know of right now. Of course, this is us on the outside looking in, Brian. There is the restaurant connected to that glove that was found about 2 miles from Nancy Guthrie's home. The glove was connected back to a restaurant employee, and that employee was cleared. There's that restaurant. And there is the restaurant at which Nancy Guthrie and Savannah Guthrie. Let's see, that video had the Arizona homecoming, where Savannah went back home and she was with her family. They went to their favorite restaurant. They spent time in Mrs. Guthrie's home. Which restaurant are we talking about, Brian?

[Brian Fitzgibbons]

We're talking about this restaurant that you see here. And you have to remember, this isn't Hollywood, Right. This is Tucson, Arizona. So you have a film crew. Savannah guthrie, a nationally recognized TV show host, rolls into this restaurant. This would be quite an event for that restaurant and the people there. And I think it's important to mention it's unlikely that it was happenstance that an abductor happened to be in the restaurant that day, you know, and saw Mrs. Guthrie. The most likely scenario is that somebody who was there, be it staff or a guest, actually communicated about, hey, I saw Savannah Guthrie with her mother at this restaurant. Another thing that law enforcement is undoubtedly doing is looking at the checks from that day. Who else was in the restaurant, who paid with a credit card, what information does the restaurant have about the other guests? And then they're going to go out that. That one additional layer and start asking everybody who was there, who they communicated with about this.

[Nancy Grace]

Another possibility, Brian fitzgibbon, is surveillance video. If it can be pulled down from the cloud of what was happening in the parking lot. If they're. Let's just go with me on this. We know we have that video from a Neighbor of cars zipping by around the time that Nancy Guthrie's pacemaker stopped connecting to the Bluetooth in her home. You know, two, three o' clock in the morning, there are people heading back and forth toward her home, toward that street. This is from our friends at Fox News. By the way, we too have heard the reports about a ransom letter in the media. As a family, we are doing everything that we can. We are ready to talk. Joining me now, Christian Hammond, artificial intelligence expertise. He is a professor of computer science at Northwestern University. Again, not shabby. Christian, director of the center for Advancing Safety of Machine Intelligence. Christian, thank you for being with us. What I'm getting at is I'm narrowing down who I'm looking for. I'm looking for a guy. What do we say, Jackie? Between five, nine and six feet. Five, nine, five, ten. At least one sleeve. One full sleeve, likely two full sleeves. I'm looking for someone that has that Ozark backpack. I'm looking for that receipt. I'm looking for someone from the Tucson area because they have a soft spot for two Tucson TV networks that maybe they grew up watching. I'm looking for someone that has a knowledge of Nancy Guthrie and her home, maybe. Maybe connected in some tenuous way, not necessarily an employee of that Mexican restaurant. I believe we're looking for someone that may have a criminal record. And now I'm looking for someone that may have conducted that Google search we talked about early on that looked for Nancy Guthrie's home address and Savannah Guthrie's salary. Okay, that's a lot of data. Christian Hammond, think about the ransom note. Could the perp, if the ransom note is in fact connected, have used AI artificial intelligence to disguise their identity?

[Christian Hammond]

Well, certainly. I mean, the power of. The power of the language models is that you can have them say something that you want to say, but in a tone and in a cadence of words that is not yours. And so you can certainly disguise yourself that way and you'll leave a little bit of a trace in doing so. But that trace is so minute and is so washed out in terms of all the other activity that's going on that you wouldn't be able to find it. And so, yes.

[Nancy Grace]

Okay, Christian, we established earlier that you're, you know, light years ahead of all of us mere mortals when it comes to this. I heard you. I know what all those words mean. But in the context of your sentence, I. And I don't know what you're. You're saying. You're telling me that Google can look through trillions of Data points, and they can find Nancy Guthrie's door cam, and they can resurrect, like, Lazarus video footage we thought didn't even exist. Well, we listened to Nanos. That was our first mistake. But that said, and we can't put all of these facts together and come up with that artificial intelligence request.

[Christian Hammond]

So finding the images is a targeted task. That is, they know where they should be looking. They know the features that are really important there, and that really gives them a lot of constraints in terms of what they're looking, Looking for. But when you're looking for an arbitrary query against a language model, where there are dozens of language models, some of them are local, some of them anyone can use, finding a tiny little piece of a request is an untenable. I mean, there's too much to search. And in the midst of all this, there might be other people who are going, I wonder what it's like. I wonder if you could generate a. A ransom note. And so they're generating them, and we will find them as well. And so we're really in a place where there's not enough focus to. In terms of what we're looking for to find the right thing. And I think it's actually in the movie. In the movie about Turing and all of the work they did in terms of decrypting, there was a moment where once he identified a target, that they knew they were looking for a particular thing in a particular message that gave them the ability to figure out what was going on. But if you don't have a target, it's incredibly difficult to find the right thing at the right time that gives you the right kind of information.

[Nancy Grace]

Okay, Christian Hammond, you are the artificial intelligence expert. In a perfect world, what would I need to track down that AI request to write the ransom node?

[Christian Hammond]

Well, a perfect world would be that we would be able to take a look at all the logs of all the interactions trivially. But that's a perfect world in terms of one thing, and that's finding stuff. But it's not a perfect world in terms of privacy, in terms of data leakage, in terms of feeling like I'm using a system and I'm not telling it my entire life, and that life will be shared with everyone. So there have always been privacy issues. So even with the finding the, you know, finding the images associated with this particular camera, there were privacy issues that is that she didn't have a subscription, and so they should not have been holding on to anything, but they were getting to the. All the camera all the footage associated with the cameras in her neighborhood. That's a privacy issue. That is that unless you've signed off for your camera to be used, you can't use it. And so there's always this.

[Nancy Grace]

Okay, I understand. So there really is no perfect world in finding that AI request. Okay, let me ask you this. Many people have suggested there's a possibility of doing a retinal scan on the porch guy. There's some great shots of his eyes. What do you make of that? Let's see the shots.

[Christian Hammond]

Yeah, the problem is that they're good, but they're not magnificent. So retinal scans usually are done using infrared light to begin with. And they're marvelous. I mean, they're incredibly powerful in terms of being able to identify individuals. But you need that as the target. That is, if I've got a new image and I could get a retinal scan out of it, I've got to find. I have to have a thing to match it against. And we. We don't really have that. The other thing is that in these.

[Nancy Grace]

So even if there was enough data, Christian, to get the retinal scan and you're saying it's just beyond enhancing it from those images, we have to have something to compare it to, like fingerprints. You may have a great fingerprint, but you got to have somebody to compare it to.

[Christian Hammond]

So he could leave fingerprints and DNA and footprints and all sorts of things. But if there's not a target for us to match them against, it doesn't help us unless we have him in hand.

[Nancy Grace]

Okay, Christian Hammond, I want you to go back to your think tank at Northwestern University and come up with some answers for me. Christian Hammond, Jeff Garnett, Brian Fitzgibbons, Joe Scott Morgan and Dave Mack. Thank you for being with us, everyone. If you know or think you know anything about the disappearance of Nancy Guthrie, please dial toll free 800-225-5324. To remain anonymous, 520-882-7463. There is a 1.2 plus million dollar reward for information leading to the whereabouts of Nancy Guthrie. Arrest, conviction not required. We remember American hero. Police officer Jamie Roman, Philly pd Shot and killed in the line of duty. Leaving behind a grieving wife turned widow and children sentenced to life without their dad, American hero Police officer Jamie Roman. Nancy Grace signing off. Goodbye, friend.

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[Nancy Grace]

Life moves really quickly at American Military University. They're ready to help you keep up. AMU's flexible, affordable online programs in cybersecurity, IT space studies, and more are designed for service members, veterans and their families. AMU provides the support you need to take the next step. Step wherever life takes you. American Military University built for what's next. Learn more at AMU APUS. EDU that's amu.apus. eDU

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